Social media is one of those things that everyone thinks they understand perfectly. After all, we’ve all had a Facebook page for years now – and we’ve even mastered the art of the 140-character bon mot on Twitter. We’ve all seen an analytics report, and we’ve all pinned a photo or applied an Instagram filter. Attend just about any cocktail party and you’ll be able to hear a lot of very confident opinions about how social media ought to be used.
This often leads business owners to assume that they don’t need anyone to help them with the social media aspects of their business. They figure they’ll handle it themselves in their spare time. This is a disastrous decision, however, that has far-reaching consequences for different aspects of your business. There are several reasons why having a dedicated social media manager is an absolute essential piece of your business puzzle.
Reason One: Scale
Social media is bigger than Facebook. It’s bigger than Twitter. It’s bigger than any single platform, in fact, because they’re all related. From the smallest start-up to the biggest, most well-established social media channel, in order to have total coverage and maximum impact you have to work all the platforms, and that’s simply too much for any one person to comfortably handle.
Reason Two: Tools
Social media platforms have different applications and different audiences. Some of these concepts are simple – Instagram is for photo sharing, twitter for text-based communication – but often have complex wrinkles. For example, you can share a photo on Twitter as well – when is it a better channel for that? A social media czar can determine the best use of these channels.
Reason Three: Strategy
You can’t simply randomly post things to various platforms, they have to work together like a symphony of information. A manager can plan out the day’s tweets, posts, pins, and other social media actions well in advance so they work together and form a cohesive whole.
Reason Four: Pace
Social media moves fast, and sees a lot of turnover. You can’t just post things once, you have to post them several times over the course of a few days in order to ensure that every potential customer sees it, or is reminded to click on it or share it. It’s a lot of work, and if you’re distracted by other aspects of the business it’s more likely to be pushed aside and handled haphazardly.
Reason Five: Innovation
Social media is huge – and that means new channels are being developed every day. Most fail to significantly change the equation. Some, like Ello, make a mark and might have a chance at becoming a major player. You can’t simply assume the world of social media will always be Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Google Plus – change is always possible, and whoever’s managing your social media needs to always be aware of what’s happening.
In the end, wearing too many hats is potentially a huge problem. Focus on what you do best, and have someone else focus on the social media.